Blueprint Magazine: 3D printing, but not for crappy objects

With caution: “while 3D printing is becoming increasingly accessible, a cautious approach is advised unless the world is to be filled with crappy keyring-like objects”.

The technique of 3D printing has been around since the Seventies, but recent developments have made it available for a broad range of design professionals. Now it has penetrated almost every sector – architects, fashion designers and product developers are experimenting with this ‘democratised’ technique: for designing concepts, for experimenting with materials, for constructing and assembling protypes and products. But, warns Blueprint, the goal is not to celebrate the technology itself but to understand it and know how to apply it.

However, that there are huge possibilities is clear. Blueprint shows some exemplary cases: caramic-printed bricks, developed by architect Brian Peters, the VOLTAGE collection of fashion designer Iris van Herpen, product design by Digits2Widgets, the ornaments and jewelry of Jon Hodgson.

That even the sky isn’t the limit anymore shows a recent project by architect Norman Foster + Partners and the European Space Agency. Together they are figuering out a way to print research stations on the surface of the moon. The team already produced a prototype wall, which weighs 1.5 metric tons and is made from simulated lunar regolith. They used Basaltic rock from a volcano in central Italy, a material that is believed to bear a 99.8 percent resemblance to lunar soil.

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